We are in St Helena now, a two week sail from Cape Town, but in the meantime here’s a post about our time in Cape Town.

Wednesday 18th January to Wednesday 22nd February 2023

We had made it to Cape Town and were absolutely delighted to be there. The final of the three dreaded passages from The Seychelles now completed and without any major problems along the way… at times even rather enjoyable! 

The first week in Cape Town we spent in the Royal Cape Yacht Club, waiting for a slot with the crane so our mast could be lifted and the cable to the anemometer (the instrument that measures wind speed and direction) at the top could be removed and a new one threaded down inside the mast. 

The Royal Cape Yacht Club is a huge marina where most of the yachts are owned by local sailors, many of whom take part in the weekend races around Robben Island (where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for over 18 years). It has a lively atmosphere, a great restaurant, hot showers, free laundry and most of the repair facilities are based here. The main problem is that it is in the secure dock area and rather isolated, considered unsafe to walk outside the dock gates (one of the security guards at the RCYC told us she had had her bag snatched on her short walk to work) and most of our cruising friends were berthed over at the V&A marina. One morning I had a hairdresser appointment and having had several Uber drivers cancel on us as they were unable to get through security gates into the docks, only by walking to outside the gates and finding a taxi did we manage to get there in time. Hugh got his hair cut too at the same salon along with a hair wash, head massage and blow dry, shave (with three different razors), ear and nose wax, facial and eyebrow sculpture. His took longer than my simple wash, cut and blow dry and was half the price. Something is very wrong here. 

After a week of waiting for our slot with the crane (which was cancelled several times as they had a big, expensive Oyster to work on), one morning the riggers, Craig & Andrej, turned up to replace the cable. ‘You don’t need the mast taken off, we can do it with the mast on’. We explained to them how Jacques in Richard Bay had tried it this way and broken the cable. Two hours later the job was done! We were thrilled and by the afternoon we were out of the RCYC and on our way round to the V&A marina. The following morning Hugh caught his plane home to attend his father’s funeral. I stayed on to supervise ongoing work on Vega. 

The V&A marina is adjacent to the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront area of Cape Town, a vibrant area developed in part of the commercial docks, attracting tourists and locals to its malls, shops, bars and restaurants, with buskers playing music, dancing and singing. I enjoyed going out to wander around, soaking up the atmosphere and for coffee, drinks and meals with Jon and other sailing friends.

Above: four South African Nobel Peace Prize winners (and one interloper) – Chief Albert Luthuli (1961), Archbishop Desmond Tutu (1984), FW de Klerk and Nelson Mandela (1993).

The marina is also home to a large number of seals who lounge around on the pontoons in the sun, getting a bit stroppy if you come too close, flirting and squabbling with each other, lying on their backs in the water with their fins up in the air snoozing, and occasionally fishing, the shoals of small fish in the marina providing an easy meal for the lazy creatures. There are also sea otters who like to explore inside the boats, we had one in our cockpit on two occasions but fortunately our Perspex washboard was in place so it couldn’t get down the steps into our saloon. Sean on Rehua, a catamaran, had an otter right inside their boat which he was only aware of when it nuzzled against his leg. 

As usual a fair amount of socialising went on (cruisers are a friendly, sociable lot as no doubt you’ve gathered by now) both at the RCYC and when moved over to the V&A marina.

Laura & Dick on SY Maia kindly invited me to join them in their hire car to drive out to the pretty Cape Dutch town of Stellenbosch about 30 miles outside the city and to visit Babylonstoren, one of the largest farms in the region with formal fruit and vegetable gardens laid out in a classical Dutch style. The scenery of the Western Cape is strikingly beautiful with mountain ranges rising up around the hundreds of acres of vineyards, first established by French Huguenots in the 17th century.

Above: Stellenbosch, a pretty Dutch Colonial university town with the streets shaded by oak trees

Hugh arrived back a week later with a replacement pump for the heads and various other boat parts, so repairs could continue. The next day he complained he’d lost his sense of taste. Two days later he developed cold symptoms and his Covid test was positive. Another couple of days after that I had a sore throat and a positive test and joined him in bed feeling unwell, aching, tired, headache and coughing, and binge watched Derry Girls. We quarantined on the boat and Jon & Karene kindly brought us a pastries and biscuits to have with our morning coffee. 

In the meantime work had continued on Vega. The bottom of the boat was cleaned by Andrea in her dive gear, who also checked the anodes. Phillip the engine man, who had already had Covid four times, came on board to check an oil leak in the engine. Karl the electrician postponed until we were less infectious, then joined the new cable coming down the mast from the anemometer to the wiring which leads to the wind instrument in the cockpit and wired up a replacement navigation light that Hugh had fixed at the bow. We had our old genoa taken away for repair as it was looking rather tatty. The main electronic bilge pump was no longer working (rather important in case water starts leaking into the boat) so we had the spare one we carry fitted. Paul fitted a retaining block for the anchor to stop it rattling around when sailing. Hugh installed the new pump on the heads but they were still leaking so we had the sea water inlet hose to the toilet replaced (hopefully this will be an end to the saga of our blocked/leaking heads, at least for now). We had the gas cylinders refilled and spare jerry cans refilled with diesel. I revarnished the hatch where the old varnish was cracking, repaired and cleaned some of the upholstery, washed all the boat’s curtains and continued reprovisioning with deliveries direct to the boat by Woolworths. 

After ten days our Covid tests were negative but we still didn’t feel well enough to take advantage of an imminent weather window to head off across the south Atlantic. We hadn’t been up Table Mountain yet and there was sightseeing around Cape Town that we’d missed out on. 

Hugh and I walked over to the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art, an impressive building in a old silo with interior glass lifts dramatically rising up inside the cutaway silos. The range of art by African artists was impressive too although the installations left us somewhat mystified. 

We joined other cruiser friends for a circular trip on the red hop-on hop-off bus through CapeTown to the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens then on, past a sprawl of townships stretching up the hillside…….

……….to Hout Bay to meet up with Pepe & Blanka from Argo and Susan & Martin from Shenemere who were moored in the bay there.

Above: Hout Bay, fishing boats, tourist gift shop and tame seal. Below: fish & chip lunch with other yachties in the ’famous’ Snoekies fish restaurant

The drive back was along the coast, under the Twelve Disciples, rather more than 12 huge rocky outcrops that are part of the same range as Table Mountain, and through smart coastal suburbs such as Clifton, where the celebrities and wealthy of Cape Town live, with appropriately astronomical property prices as the commentary on the bus informed us. 

The Saturday farmers market, walking distance from the Waterfront, was a regular place for breakfast (usually eggs Benedict) and shopping from the amazing range of produce – cheeses, sausages, pastries, bread, fruit and veg etc etc.

We enjoyed our time in Cape Town which is considered one of the most beautiful cities in the world, mainly due to its spectacular location, dominated by Table Mountain which is visible from almost anywhere you are in the city, often overhung with its tablecloth of cloud spilling over and down its sides, even when the rest of the sky is clear.

The recently renovated V&A Waterfront is certainly a great area to be and there are pockets of older areas such as Kloof Street with its huge range of restaurants (we would highly recommend the Black Sheep if you visit Cape Town, we shared a starter of Chinese marlin ceviche, Hugh enjoyed his very tender kudu and my parpadelle and braised springbok in red wine with mushrooms was sublime). There is Bo Kaap, a mainly Muslim area of cobbled streets, colourful houses and mosques, which crawls with photographers trying to get that great Instagram shot.

Apart from that much of the city is quite nondescript with dual carriageways running past unimaginative high-rise buildings and the encroaching slums. There are areas where it is considered unsafe to walk but of course this is true of other cities we’ve visited where such disparity between wealth and poverty exist. 

Driving out of Cape Town you pass mile upon mile of corrugated iron shacks cheek to jowl, many without water or electricity supplies. Tours of the townships are on offer but we didn’t feel comfortable doing this, although Tamara, one of the security guards at the marina, suggested we’d be welcomed by the people there who want more awareness of the conditions under which they live as well as appreciating any contributions made to help them.

Within the city you pass encampments of tents and roughly erected shacks along the roadside and under flyovers. At the traffic lights beggars approach your car and on the streets in the city too you are accosted by young men wanting you to buy milk for their sister or daughter. We were told there is a significant drug problem in South Africa especially in the big cities and, although I would often slip the beggars a twenty rand note, there are probably better ways to offer support through one of the organisations that help the homeless. Many people come from other parts of South Africa and from other African countries hoping to make a better life for themselves but work is hard to get here and wages are low. Our Uber drivers, always a good source of information on peoples’ lives, came from Zimbabwe, Sudan, Congo and Lesotho to escape war or poverty. Our driver from Sudan had been here for years, set up several businesses and was putting his children through university, doing their Masters. He looked forward to retiring back to Sudan to grow mangoes and to laze around. The ones from Zimbabwe despaired of their country, which had got even worse since Mugabe died, they described it wearily as more of just the same. 

Visiting here and learning a bit more about its history brings home just how horrible and inhuman apartheid was and that terrible scars remain. The major party in Cape Town and the Western Cape is the Democratic Party with a white leader and it seems to be widely recognised that conditions for business and the infrastructure are better here than elsewhere in South Africa. We were told that the ruling ANC encourages expansion of the Cape Town townships in the run up to elections to try and tip the black vote in its favour in the province. The ANC is universally loathed by the white population as corrupt and incompetent and it seems ironic that the one province in which it doesn’t have a ruling majority has the parliamentary capital of South Africa.The climate and natural resources in South Africa are fantastic but the contrast between rich and poor is great and we were surprised by the lack of integration between the races. Clearly many black South Africans are doing well economically but the majority appears not to be with unemployment in the country around 30%. The political and economic problems and instability mean many South Africans, and not just white ones, are hoping to leave the country or have left, surely to its detriment. We heard more than one local say ‘Mandela must be turning in his grave’.

Several of the boats had decided to stay on in Cape Town until September or October, seeing little point in continuing to the Caribbean only to arrive at the start of the hurricane season in June. Jo and Lex on Joint Venture (New Zealand), Tanya and Ash on Windwalker (Australia) and Craig and Karene on Il Sogno (USA)  all decided to leave their boats here and enjoy the relatively cheap delights of Cape Town, as well as flying home for a month or two. Colin and Izzi on Endorphin Beta (Scottish through and through) had left four weeks ahead of us. Jon on Hecla (English) had intended to sail with them but had last minute steering problems. He’d then planned to leave with us but eventually determined to wait until the spring here to leave. Dick and Laura on Maia (USA) were two weeks ahead of us on their way to St Helena and Eric and Arliss on Corroboree (also USA) would be leaving a couple of weeks after us. Audrie and Sean on Rehua (Belgian & British) with their teenage sons had decided to stay on for a whole year as they were enjoying Cape Town so much and wanted some stability for their sons whilst studying for exams. Ben, Ashley and kids on Nahoa (Canadian) only arrived in V&A a few days before we left and will be heading off in a couple of months. Pepe and Blanka on Argo (Czechia) were staying round the corner in Hout Bay a bit longer, as were Martin and Susan on Shenemere (South African and Canadian but USA domiciled). So you can see we are a truly international lot of cruisers! 

At last we were beginning to feel sufficiently recovered from Covid to set sail with a good weather window coming up in a couple of days, but we still hadn’t been up Table Mountain. After five days of strong winds, meaning the cable car was closed, and with the top of Table Mountain shrouded in a blanket of cloud, the wind at last died and the cloud cleared. We headed off early to beat the rush only to find long queues of other tourists with the same idea. We didn’t have the energy, post-Covid, for the three hour steep and sometimes precarious trek up, but stunning views made the two hour wait for the cable car worthwhile, and after a coffee at the top we did a circular walk around the plateau with the obligatory photos down over Cape Town. 

A final delay as Hugh managed to get a last minute appointment with Dr Docran, a dermatologist, to get more worrying skin lumps check over and frozen… all ok thankfully, this time.

We finally set off at noon on the Wednesday, towards St Helena, an island in the middle of the South Atlantic with a fascinating history. The weather forecast was good, hopefully trade winds with us all the way, with an anticipated 1700 mile passage of about 14 days. The first of five long passages to be home in Bristol by June.